


You Don't Know Him

by ArthurHavisham



Category: Arthur Havisham - Fandom, Dickensian - Fandom
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-09
Updated: 2016-03-09
Packaged: 2018-05-24 00:25:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6135186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArthurHavisham/pseuds/ArthurHavisham
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As Arthur stood on that ledge, he felt a pair of hands around his waist that would soon after lead him to the life that he could only have hoped for before his beautiful monster came into his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Don't Know Him

Arthur stood there, the wind lashing at his tired face, arms outstretched and desperate for salvation. He stood there for a while as he watched the quiet of the world below, knowing that nothing would stop him from falling from the fragile perch of slate on which he stood. His dear sister had disowned him and now he felt what it was truly like to have nothing. He had been stripped of Amelia’s love for him and any signs of hope had long vanished with Compeyson. He had done this and now he was condemning himself to a world beyond that of which that he knew now- a world alone in life and in death. He thought of nothing but rest from the cruelty inflicted upon him and the cruelty that has become his only friend now. His body was aching for relief and he could so easily give it. The cold bite of the wind did nothing but draw more tears and snot but he made no attempt to wipe them from his face. His dark blonde curls fell in front of his brown eyes, now grey with pain and misery but still he did not move them as they whipped at him. Although in the alcohol was warming his veins and tempting him further from safety until one foot strayed too far and he slipped. This was it, he thought. The ending fitting for a villain like him. When the rest of his weary body had been dragged from the ledge, he felt a warm grip around his wrist. “Arthur!” He looked up to see the only face that could provide him with comfort- Matthew Pocket. 

Staring up at his cousin, Arthur felt limitless. He was dangling off of a ledge and Matthew, dear Matthew, had come to save him. He pondered this for a moment before feeling the tears well in his eyes once again. He had been ready for death, ready for something other than the wretched life that had ensnared him with every breath he took, but now he found a new comfort in that life. Havisham felt Pocket's grip around his wrist tighten and heard loud grunts as he was hauled back to safety. As soon as he felt his feet touch upon the hard ground, Arthur fell into his cousin's arms and sobbed for all that had happened and all that he had lost. Matthew could do nothing but hold the weeping mess tighter in his arms and whisper reassurance that everything was going to be all right in the end. 

But Arthur could not believe him. He focused only on the hurt that he had caused and everything that had gone wrong- he had done all of this and there was nothing he could do to stop it. For a while longer, the two cousins just sighed in the other's arms until Pocket decided that they should return to somewhere that they couldn't be tempted by the sharp decline of screaming salvation. Arthur still did not wipe the tears from his eyes though now he claimed that it was the harsh lash of the wind that abused his eyes and caused them to leak crystal pearls of sadness. The pair carefully made their way to the window of where the young Havisham was staying, Matthew following closely behind him just to make sure that he didn't slip on purpose. Once inside, Arthur searched frantically for a bottle of something that would mother thoughts of his sister's face from him but he knew that it had become permanently imprinted in his minds and had been ever since he last left Satis House. He searched under pillows that became heavy with the weight of a thousand nightmares; under the threadbare duvet that offered him little protection at night; behind the chair that he sat upon the last time he imagined Amelia, eerily clad in the pure white of her wedding dress and standing on the bed before him, wailing and cursing him to the Heavens. He walked towards the dresser where everything that had no place belonged. His eyes scanned over the things piled there until they rested on the straight knife that laid there; he stared at it for a while and the temptation crept upon him once more. His fingers traced the patterns engraved on the wood of the handle and he clasped it in them, wondering what would happen if he so easily pulled it across his throat until crimson red blood seeped from it. Just then, he felt a hand upon his shoulder and then he knew that nothing would be gained from his demise. He dropped it and he found a bottle, almost empty, but offered enough liquid to lull him into a restless slumber. He looked up from his place on the dresser and found himself staring at the man in the mirror- Arthur Havisham. He focused on the withering figure that stared back at him until he realised that it was no longer him that he was looking at it. It had become Merriwether Compeyson, the man that destroyed everything. He was smiling, laughing at the mess that Arthur had become. All the times that the pair had looked into that same mirror, neither of them knew that this would be the thing that caused the brother the most pain. It was in this mirror that he was mercilessly reminded of how he had fallen into Compeyson's trap, reminded of how he had lost his sister to him- how he was now the broken one.  
Arthur doubted that he would ever make it out of the state that he was prisoner to, unencumbered by the threats of the world and the threats of those that he posed to himself. Nobody would love him like Amelia used to and this scared him. Was he now condemned to living the rest of his life, an invisible man, in an invisible room, in an invisible world that no longer existed past that of his prison-like mind.


End file.
